Hi everyone,

We have 3 dogs (13 yo boxer/pitt mix, 5 yo pitt/bassett?? mix and 2yo pitt/stafforshire mix). And 3 cats but this is a DOG forum

Maybe somebody can help me understand my dogs better and offer some advice. The one I'm concerned about is the 2yo pitt/staffordshire mix - Maddie. She has been in a few fights with my other older dogs but things seemed to calm down now - I walk them together all the time (well not the old one) and watch for any signs of problems. However I am now scared to introduce her to other dogs. When we go for walks she is whining when she sees other dogs, and wants to meet them - but I can't tell if she wants to play or will react badly. It seems it takes her all of 2 sec to go from "I want to play to I want to fight". She is very skittish - afraid of noises, sticks - which I am working on. But I don't know how to introduce her to more dogs? She has a neighbor's dog - a male lab - that she loves to play with. And we used to take her to play with another pitt. But most of our friends have dogs that are a bit aloof and so they don't want to play with her and let her know it, which I'm sure is not helping her. I exersize her and walk her but I want to build her confidence around other dogs (without freaking out myself that she will get in a fight). I don't know what caused her skittishness - we got her from a resque organization at about 14 weeks and she's been that way since.

We now have new neighbors that have 2 dogs - we have a fence separating us - the dogs are people friendly, but very territorial. She is now afraid to go pick up her toy if it fell next to the fence. She is so scared and unsure around them that it pains me to watch her. She whines and she wants to go sniff them over the fence and just gets barked and growled at Anything I can do? (neighbors are keeping those dogs outside 100% of the time and are almost never home to even go talk to them)

[chevy & karen]

Originally Posted by feeline00

Hi everyone,

We have 3 dogs (13 yo boxer/pitt mix, 5 yo pitt/bassett?? mix and 2yo pitt/stafforshire mix). And 3 cats but this is a DOG forum

Maybe somebody can help me understand my dogs better and offer some advice. The one I'm concerned about is the 2yo pitt/staffordshire mix - Maddie. She has been in a few fights with my other older dogs but things seemed to calm down now - I walk them together all the time (well not the old one) and watch for any signs of problems. However I am now scared to introduce her to other dogs. When we go for walks she is whining when she sees other dogs, and wants to meet them - but I can't tell if she wants to play or will react badly. It seems it takes her all of 2 sec to go from "I want to play to I want to fight". She is very skittish - afraid of noises, sticks - which I am working on. But I don't know how to introduce her to more dogs? She has a neighbor's dog - a male lab - that she loves to play with. And we used to take her to play with another pitt. But most of our friends have dogs that are a bit aloof and so they don't want to play with her and let her know it, which I'm sure is not helping her. I exersize her and walk her but I want to build her confidence around other dogs (without freaking out myself that she will get in a fight). I don't know what caused her skittishness - we got her from a resque organization at about 14 weeks and she's been that way since.

We now have new neighbors that have 2 dogs - we have a fence separating us - the dogs are people friendly, but very territorial. She is now afraid to go pick up her toy if it fell next to the fence. She is so scared and unsure around them that it pains me to watch her. She whines and she wants to go sniff them over the fence and just gets barked and growled at Anything I can do? (neighbors are keeping those dogs outside 100% of the time and are almost never home to even go talk to them)

Hi and welcome to the site.. I don't know how to help you and your pup but I would put this in the behavior sub forum and hopefully someone who has an answer will see this... Good luck to you and your pup and please give him a hug from chevy & karen..

[wishbone]

Welcome to you and your big furbabies! Sad to hear about your Maddie, when did you get her? Did you get her when she's a puppy? Do you have any information on her background? Also did you considered a training or obedience class, there are experts that could give advice and training for Maddie's behavior.

HI feeline00, WELCOME ON THE FORUM